Key question in the air
IT IS as if a hurricane has hit the British Labour Party. The heads of political heavyweights such as Jack Straw and Charles Clarke and several others have rolled in the cabinet reshuffle that followed the party's dismal showing in local elections.
Hurricane warnings were being heard for some time and the poor showing by Prime Minister Blair's party was in the making. Damaging headlines prompted by revelations of incompetence and sleaze allegations have been a feature in the media for several weeks. Blair had been reeling back from some of the charges levelled against his close colleagues lieutenants that added to the pressure he was already facing from the unpopular British military involvement in Iraq.
Indeed, local council elections could not be an accurate reflection of popular thinking when it comes to parliamentary polls, but there is no mistaking the fact that Blair's New Labour is on a downward slide.
Blair moved quickly to reshuffle the cabinet on Friday, in hours after it became clear that the problems hitting the party took their toll in the form of nearly 320 seats in local councils. Almost all of them were lost to the opposition Conservatives. The Liberal Democrats won a greater share of the vote than Labour but this only translated into 16 extra seats.
However, a British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) projection showed the Liberal Democrats accounting for 27 per cent of the total votes cast compared with the Labour's 26 per cent and the more than 40 per cent of the Conservatives. That the Liberal Democrats seem to be catching up with the Labour is yet another bad news for Blair.
Blair's reshuffle seems to be desperate attempt to shore up the sagging fortunes of his party that had come to power with great promises in 1998 but failed to keep many of them. If anything, he was also seen as too subservient to US President George W Bush. On the domestic front, his policies in the wake of the Sept.11 attacks in the US were deemed too harsh, particularly his crackdown on people, some of whose only charge could be that they could be suspected of harbouring militancy.
The July 2005 bombing attacks in London were cited by pro-government figures seeking to justify Blair's tough approach, but it has all but been accepted that the motivations behind the bombings had to do with the British involvement in Iraq than homegrown terrorism aimed at the establishment for the sake of targeting the establishment.
In any event, Blair's cabinet reshuffle could only be a short-term measure. The prime minister has been facing a revolt within his party ranks in parliament and he had only scraped through in some of the key votes despite having a comfortable majority in the assembly. Analysts are already asking whether Blair would be able to weather the bitter criticism that would follow from within the party after the dismal performance in local elections and possibly lead to a parliamentary rebellion for his resignation.
Wednesday, May 10, 2006
May 1 Dangerous recipe
Dangerous recipe
THE call by the senior-most Democrat in the powerful US Senate Foreign Relations Committee for dividing Iraq into three separate regions — Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni — with a central government in Baghdad is the first official but implicit acknowledgement of what was predicted a decade before the US invaded the country in March 2003.
However, Joseph Biden's call, which came in a column he wrote in the New York Times, seems to take a simplistic view of the overall situation in Iraq, the country's ethnic divides and natural resources.
The objective of the proposed division is to ease the way out of Iraq for the US military (provided that the hawkish camp in Washington is indeed ready to contemplate letting the strategic prize go).
Notwithstanding the brave fronts put up by senior Bush administration officials such as Vice-President Dick Cheney, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others, the reality on the ground in Iraq today is that the mighty US military is far from any meaningful control of the country.
Therefore, Biden's idea, as he himself put it, "is to maintain a united Iraq by decentralising it, giving each ethno-religious group ... room to run its own affairs, while leaving the central government in charge of common interests."
He also suggests that President George Bush "must direct the military to design a plan for withdrawing and redeploying our troops from Iraq by 2008 (while providing for a small but effective residual force to combat terrorists and keep the neighbours honest)."
One wonders how a "small but effective residual force" could be defined. Even with more than 150,000 soldiers present in Iraq at one point and the use of advanced technology and ruthlessness, the US military could not contain the insurgency.
It seems that Biden is suggesting an Afghanistan-like arrangement in Iraq. Let the Iraqis deal with the worsening crises in the urban areas while the US military — with no commitment to intervene to ensure security — sticks around with a scaled down force in the countryside hunting for "terrorists" but not really making a difference. At the same time, the US military retains the capability to intervene in any situation where Washington finds its interests being threatened. Isn't that what is happening Afghanistan?
Biden and other likeminded American politicians should learn a little bit more about Iraq and its people before coming up with such suggestions. A simplified version of history would be that the country was a colonial creation that bound together communities which did not want to remain together but had no choice. The US invasion unravelled those bindings. The communities which now find themselves free from all bindings want to go their own way. Maintaining the territorial integrity of Iraq is not a priority for them. Therefore, Biden's suggestion, if accepted and implemented for whatever reason, is the perfect recipe for the country to splinter along sectarian lines, with no one in Baghdad or anywhere else in control, common interests or no common interests.
THE call by the senior-most Democrat in the powerful US Senate Foreign Relations Committee for dividing Iraq into three separate regions — Kurdish, Shiite and Sunni — with a central government in Baghdad is the first official but implicit acknowledgement of what was predicted a decade before the US invaded the country in March 2003.
However, Joseph Biden's call, which came in a column he wrote in the New York Times, seems to take a simplistic view of the overall situation in Iraq, the country's ethnic divides and natural resources.
The objective of the proposed division is to ease the way out of Iraq for the US military (provided that the hawkish camp in Washington is indeed ready to contemplate letting the strategic prize go).
Notwithstanding the brave fronts put up by senior Bush administration officials such as Vice-President Dick Cheney, Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others, the reality on the ground in Iraq today is that the mighty US military is far from any meaningful control of the country.
Therefore, Biden's idea, as he himself put it, "is to maintain a united Iraq by decentralising it, giving each ethno-religious group ... room to run its own affairs, while leaving the central government in charge of common interests."
He also suggests that President George Bush "must direct the military to design a plan for withdrawing and redeploying our troops from Iraq by 2008 (while providing for a small but effective residual force to combat terrorists and keep the neighbours honest)."
One wonders how a "small but effective residual force" could be defined. Even with more than 150,000 soldiers present in Iraq at one point and the use of advanced technology and ruthlessness, the US military could not contain the insurgency.
It seems that Biden is suggesting an Afghanistan-like arrangement in Iraq. Let the Iraqis deal with the worsening crises in the urban areas while the US military — with no commitment to intervene to ensure security — sticks around with a scaled down force in the countryside hunting for "terrorists" but not really making a difference. At the same time, the US military retains the capability to intervene in any situation where Washington finds its interests being threatened. Isn't that what is happening Afghanistan?
Biden and other likeminded American politicians should learn a little bit more about Iraq and its people before coming up with such suggestions. A simplified version of history would be that the country was a colonial creation that bound together communities which did not want to remain together but had no choice. The US invasion unravelled those bindings. The communities which now find themselves free from all bindings want to go their own way. Maintaining the territorial integrity of Iraq is not a priority for them. Therefore, Biden's suggestion, if accepted and implemented for whatever reason, is the perfect recipe for the country to splinter along sectarian lines, with no one in Baghdad or anywhere else in control, common interests or no common interests.
May 6 Counterproductive for peace
Counter-productive for peace
THE DEMONSTRATIONS in the streets of Palestine to press demands of overdue salaries from the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) are signals of brewing trouble for the Hamas-led Palestinian government. Indeed, the PNA employees are in serious trouble because they have not been paid salaries for March and April, and the economy of the occupied territories are in doldroms not simply because of the cash shortage but as a result of decades of a deliberate Israeli policy of making the people under occupation dependent on the Israeli economy. At the same time, pressuring the Hamas government for political reasons — it was obvious that Fatah was behind the demonstrations — might not be the right approach at this juncture. The world knows that the PNA is facing a cash crisis because of political reasons prompted by Hamas winning elections and assuming power. Those behind the pressure are trying to exploit the situation and force compromises over the Palestinian rights. The strongest among the holdouts against any compromise whatsoever is indeed Hamas.
That should be a key consideration for the same Palestinians who took to the streets on Saturday.
It is highly unlikely that Hamas would bend under pressure because that would go against the Islamist record of remaining firm on their positions. On the other hand, if the group is assured that Israel would recognise and respect the legitimate Palestinians rights, then the day is near when it would accept the demands that it renounce armed resistance as a means for liberation and recognise Israel.
Israel and its backers know this well. However, since Israel has no intention of respecting the Palestinian rights and entering a peace agreement on the basis of these rights, the Hamas position suits it well. In all probability, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert might indeed be hoping that Hamas refuses to budge until such time he implements his unilateral plan to draw Israel's final borders without Palestinian agreement.
This is the reality facing the international Quartet, which is meeting on Tuesday to discuss the dealock in Palestine. The group needs no elaborate explanation of the geopolitics behind the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It the Quartet opts to play by the rules based on publicly stated positions of the two sides — Hamas declining to meet the demands imposed on it and Israel arguing that it does not have a Palestinian negotiating partner — then it does not have do make further move to explain to the world that it is only paying lipservice to the rights of the Palestinians and international legitimacy.
In the meantime, the politicised demonstrations aimed at applying pressure on the Hamas government could be counter-productive to the Palestinian cause. If the Hamas government were to collapse — as some parties might want to see — then Palestinian politics would undergo a dramatic change to the worse, and that would not serve the cause of peace in the Middle East.
THE DEMONSTRATIONS in the streets of Palestine to press demands of overdue salaries from the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) are signals of brewing trouble for the Hamas-led Palestinian government. Indeed, the PNA employees are in serious trouble because they have not been paid salaries for March and April, and the economy of the occupied territories are in doldroms not simply because of the cash shortage but as a result of decades of a deliberate Israeli policy of making the people under occupation dependent on the Israeli economy. At the same time, pressuring the Hamas government for political reasons — it was obvious that Fatah was behind the demonstrations — might not be the right approach at this juncture. The world knows that the PNA is facing a cash crisis because of political reasons prompted by Hamas winning elections and assuming power. Those behind the pressure are trying to exploit the situation and force compromises over the Palestinian rights. The strongest among the holdouts against any compromise whatsoever is indeed Hamas.
That should be a key consideration for the same Palestinians who took to the streets on Saturday.
It is highly unlikely that Hamas would bend under pressure because that would go against the Islamist record of remaining firm on their positions. On the other hand, if the group is assured that Israel would recognise and respect the legitimate Palestinians rights, then the day is near when it would accept the demands that it renounce armed resistance as a means for liberation and recognise Israel.
Israel and its backers know this well. However, since Israel has no intention of respecting the Palestinian rights and entering a peace agreement on the basis of these rights, the Hamas position suits it well. In all probability, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert might indeed be hoping that Hamas refuses to budge until such time he implements his unilateral plan to draw Israel's final borders without Palestinian agreement.
This is the reality facing the international Quartet, which is meeting on Tuesday to discuss the dealock in Palestine. The group needs no elaborate explanation of the geopolitics behind the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It the Quartet opts to play by the rules based on publicly stated positions of the two sides — Hamas declining to meet the demands imposed on it and Israel arguing that it does not have a Palestinian negotiating partner — then it does not have do make further move to explain to the world that it is only paying lipservice to the rights of the Palestinians and international legitimacy.
In the meantime, the politicised demonstrations aimed at applying pressure on the Hamas government could be counter-productive to the Palestinian cause. If the Hamas government were to collapse — as some parties might want to see — then Palestinian politics would undergo a dramatic change to the worse, and that would not serve the cause of peace in the Middle East.
April 14 Undeniable imperative
Undeniable imperative
CHAD President Idriss Deby has fought off a strong assault by insurgents bent upon unseating him. It might not be the last time that he would face such a challenge. Clearly, it is an internal Chadian affair, and it is up to the people of Chad to decide their future, and the international community, as represented by the UN, or the African Union representing the people of Africa could intervene only upon an explicit request from the Chadian government.
There is, however, an external dimension to the conflict: Dissidents battling the Sudanese government in the western Darfur region seek shelter in Chad and Chadian rebels fighting to end Deby's 16-year rule take refuge in Sudanese territory. N'Djamena and Khartoum accuse each other of supporting their respective dissidents.
According to the New York Times, weapons used in the Darfur conflict have been traced to Libya, Chad and the Central Africa Republic, which on Friday closed its border with Sudan because the rebels had crossed through it on their way to attack N'Djamena last week.
N'djamena has broken off diplomatic relations with Khartoum in the wake of Thursday's insurgent attack. Again, that is a bilateral affair, and the UN or African Union could intervene only when explicitly asked to do so with a view to ending the crisis.
However, there is the third dimension to the crisis: Chad's threat to expel some 200,000 refugees from Sudan's Darfur region, and that is most worrying.
The conflict in Darfur between the Arab militias and dissidents of African tribal origins in the region has already led to a major humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people being killed or displaced from their homes. The UN and international relief agencies are grappling with some of the most difficult conditions to assist the Darfur refugees within Sudan and beyond the border in Chad.
Deby has given the international community until June to find an end to the Darfur crisis.
"If after June we can't guarantee the security of our citizens and the refugees, then it is up to the international community to find another country to shelter these refugees," he declared on Friday.
Chad could also carry out its threat if there were to be a second wave of insurgent attack, which, according to reports from N'Djamena, is a strong possibility.
One way out of the problem is for Sudan to drop its reservations over the planned deployment of internationally backed UN forces equipped with geared to handle the Darfur crisis and maintain peace in the region. If peace takes hold in the area — pending whatever political agreement to end the crisis — then that would create an environment conducive to efforts to solve the core problem.
The need of the hour is the mindset on all parties involved to reject armed confrontation and accept dialogue as the means to settle conflicts. It is not easy, but the gravity of what could follow clearly makes it an undeniable imperative.
CHAD President Idriss Deby has fought off a strong assault by insurgents bent upon unseating him. It might not be the last time that he would face such a challenge. Clearly, it is an internal Chadian affair, and it is up to the people of Chad to decide their future, and the international community, as represented by the UN, or the African Union representing the people of Africa could intervene only upon an explicit request from the Chadian government.
There is, however, an external dimension to the conflict: Dissidents battling the Sudanese government in the western Darfur region seek shelter in Chad and Chadian rebels fighting to end Deby's 16-year rule take refuge in Sudanese territory. N'Djamena and Khartoum accuse each other of supporting their respective dissidents.
According to the New York Times, weapons used in the Darfur conflict have been traced to Libya, Chad and the Central Africa Republic, which on Friday closed its border with Sudan because the rebels had crossed through it on their way to attack N'Djamena last week.
N'djamena has broken off diplomatic relations with Khartoum in the wake of Thursday's insurgent attack. Again, that is a bilateral affair, and the UN or African Union could intervene only when explicitly asked to do so with a view to ending the crisis.
However, there is the third dimension to the crisis: Chad's threat to expel some 200,000 refugees from Sudan's Darfur region, and that is most worrying.
The conflict in Darfur between the Arab militias and dissidents of African tribal origins in the region has already led to a major humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people being killed or displaced from their homes. The UN and international relief agencies are grappling with some of the most difficult conditions to assist the Darfur refugees within Sudan and beyond the border in Chad.
Deby has given the international community until June to find an end to the Darfur crisis.
"If after June we can't guarantee the security of our citizens and the refugees, then it is up to the international community to find another country to shelter these refugees," he declared on Friday.
Chad could also carry out its threat if there were to be a second wave of insurgent attack, which, according to reports from N'Djamena, is a strong possibility.
One way out of the problem is for Sudan to drop its reservations over the planned deployment of internationally backed UN forces equipped with geared to handle the Darfur crisis and maintain peace in the region. If peace takes hold in the area — pending whatever political agreement to end the crisis — then that would create an environment conducive to efforts to solve the core problem.
The need of the hour is the mindset on all parties involved to reject armed confrontation and accept dialogue as the means to settle conflicts. It is not easy, but the gravity of what could follow clearly makes it an undeniable imperative.
April 28 Human element and terror
The human element and 'terror'
A REPORT released on Friday is a clear admission that the US-led war against terror has not only fallen far short of its objectives but has also fuelled terrorism across the globe.
The annual State Department report says that some 11,000 terrorist attacks killed 14,600 people in the year 2005. Iraq accounted for just over 30 per cent (3,500) of the 11,000 terrorist attacks worldwide and 55 per cent (8,300) of the more than 14,600 deaths.
The report affirms that the US defintion of terrorism has been broadened and hence the sharp increase in the statistics when compared with the 2004 figures ( 651 attacks and 1,907 deaths around the world).
Earlier, the criteria of "international terrorism" included only incidents involving the territory or citizens of two or more countries. The revamped definition includes incidents identified as "pre-meditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents."
Whatever the terminology, it is highly unlikely that the world could agree on a universally acceptable defition for "terrorism" that also makes a distinction between terrorist actions and legitimate resistance.
Even under the broader definition, there is a dramatic increase in the number of "terrorist attacks" as defined by the US. It should serve as a reminder for Washington to have a rethink on what went wrong where from the word go when the Bush administration launched the "war against terror" following the Sept.11 attacks in New York and Washington.
There cannot any denial that there are individuals and groups engaging in errorist attacks with the sole objective of spreading terror and creating chaos. There is nothing any country, government or people could do to meet their absurd demands and serve their senseless purposes. That paradox has no easy solution, except perhaps the society being attuned to take precautions and be ready to deal with such actions whenever they happen.
At the same time, the reason that the US-led fight against "terrorism" has made little headway despite having spent more than four years and tens of billions of dollars around the world is that the strategists behind the campaign failed to add the human element to their calculations. Poverty, unemployment and frustration stemming from denial of social justice are some of the reasons that lead to senseless actions that create terror and chaos.
Addressing such reasons need formulas to such problems depending on the geopolitics and social and economic life of individual societies. It is a mammoth task. Any beginning to embark on it needs an unambigous approach on the part of the leaders of the new world based on the understanding and acceptance that self-serving political priorities should be set aside in favour of practical solutions to real-life problems in any part of the world. People should feel that they stand to lose something if they engage in terrorism. Until that happens, the figures in the annual report on terrorism would only go up.
A REPORT released on Friday is a clear admission that the US-led war against terror has not only fallen far short of its objectives but has also fuelled terrorism across the globe.
The annual State Department report says that some 11,000 terrorist attacks killed 14,600 people in the year 2005. Iraq accounted for just over 30 per cent (3,500) of the 11,000 terrorist attacks worldwide and 55 per cent (8,300) of the more than 14,600 deaths.
The report affirms that the US defintion of terrorism has been broadened and hence the sharp increase in the statistics when compared with the 2004 figures ( 651 attacks and 1,907 deaths around the world).
Earlier, the criteria of "international terrorism" included only incidents involving the territory or citizens of two or more countries. The revamped definition includes incidents identified as "pre-meditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents."
Whatever the terminology, it is highly unlikely that the world could agree on a universally acceptable defition for "terrorism" that also makes a distinction between terrorist actions and legitimate resistance.
Even under the broader definition, there is a dramatic increase in the number of "terrorist attacks" as defined by the US. It should serve as a reminder for Washington to have a rethink on what went wrong where from the word go when the Bush administration launched the "war against terror" following the Sept.11 attacks in New York and Washington.
There cannot any denial that there are individuals and groups engaging in errorist attacks with the sole objective of spreading terror and creating chaos. There is nothing any country, government or people could do to meet their absurd demands and serve their senseless purposes. That paradox has no easy solution, except perhaps the society being attuned to take precautions and be ready to deal with such actions whenever they happen.
At the same time, the reason that the US-led fight against "terrorism" has made little headway despite having spent more than four years and tens of billions of dollars around the world is that the strategists behind the campaign failed to add the human element to their calculations. Poverty, unemployment and frustration stemming from denial of social justice are some of the reasons that lead to senseless actions that create terror and chaos.
Addressing such reasons need formulas to such problems depending on the geopolitics and social and economic life of individual societies. It is a mammoth task. Any beginning to embark on it needs an unambigous approach on the part of the leaders of the new world based on the understanding and acceptance that self-serving political priorities should be set aside in favour of practical solutions to real-life problems in any part of the world. People should feel that they stand to lose something if they engage in terrorism. Until that happens, the figures in the annual report on terrorism would only go up.
April 3 Neocons failing?
US President George W Bush could probably find a partial salvation from the crisis of confidence he faces with the American people if he could cut himself off from the hawkish neoconservatives and set the diplomatic course set by his secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, and her camp of people who have come be called realists.
The neoconservative camp, which orchestrated the political, diplomatic and military build-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, is deemed to be slowly disintegrating, with its influence and power weakening against the "realist" course spearheaded by Rice and her confidants like Deputy Secretary Robert Zoellick and Under-Secretary for Policy Nicholas Burns.
Away from the corridors of power and influence in Washington are neocons and their supporters like Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, John Bolton, Carl Rove, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Richard Perle, who had to step down as chairman of the Defence Policy Board, Michael Ledeen and several others who have been closely involved in preparing the grounds for the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
They were all linked together in a network that was led by the Foundation for the Defence of Democracies and included the American Enterprise Institute, the Centre for Security Policy, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and the Committee on the Present Danger.
Most of the neocons have close ties with Israel's right-wing Likud Party, and ardent lobbyists for the Jewish state. They are accused of orchestrating the war against Iraq in order to serve Israel's interests (since Iraq, despite being weakened following the 1991 war over Kuwait, posed the strongest challenge to the Jewish state and Saddam Hussein was a strong supporter of the Palestinians).
The neoconservatives' decline in power was seen to have started in early 2004, when it became abundantly clear that they had failed to forsee an insurgency in Iraq and then they did not have any effective solutions to counter it when it gathered strength.
However, it was not until Bush was re-elected for a second term in October 2004 that they were slowly pushed out but not in disgrace. To sideline them before the elections would have meant Bush was admitting that he had failed in his objectives in Iraq and this would have had an impact on his re-election chances.
Wolfowitz was made president of the World Bank; Feith resigned as deputy defence secretary; Bolton was sent to the UN as the US ambassador to the world body; Libby had to quit as the chief of staff of Vice-President Dick Cheney and Rove had to leave the White House in a scandal linked to the outing of an undercover Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operative.
Indeed, Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, often called the "real brains" behind the Iraq war, remain very much in power.
However, Rice and her "realist" camp are edging out the neoconservative influence and ideology — essentially based on a military approach to solving problems — from the administration, according to experts in Washington.
"Demoralised by the quagmire in Iraq, as well as President George W. Bush's still falling approval and credibility ratings, the coalition of aggressive nationalists, neoconservatives, and the Christian Right that promoted the belligerent, neo-imperial trajectory in US foreign policy has lost both its coherence and its power to dominate the political agenda here," writes Jim Lobe on www.antiwar.com.
"As a result — and almost by default — realists under Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and in the uniformed military have steadily gained control over the administration's policy," according to Lobe.
Rice's recent admission that the US had made "thousands" of "tactical" mistakes in Iraq was taken as an implicit hit at the neocons, who appeared to have expected the people of Iraq to embrace the American military as their liberators and ready to start a new life under American directions after the ouster of Saddam Hussein.
In the meantime, Rice is going ahead with the "realist" policy, which puts a greater emphasis on diplomacy, says Lobe, who refers to "The National Security Strategy of the United States of America," released in March.
He describes the document as a "kinder, gentler version of its fire-breathing 2002 predecessor that laid out the doctrinal justification for the March 2003 invasion." He asserts that "the new version puts a greater emphasis on diplomacy and development, tending alliances, and other realist themes, even as it continues the administration's defense of preemptive military action with Iran squarely in mind."
Rice's constant travel — as well as that of Zoellick and Burns — "not only demonstrates the priority the administration has placed on cultivating allies and even states more sceptical of US benevolence. It also suggests that the State Department — the bastion of foreign policy realism — is considerably more confident of its own power within the administration."
How does the shift in Washington affect prospects for peace in the Middle East?
Not much, experts say. President Bush is committed to supporting Israel's unilateral moves and has in fact signed a document affirming his endorsement of Sharon's plans to annex parts of the West Bank and his refusal to recognise the right of the Palestinian refugees to return to their pre-1948 homes in what is now Israel.
It is widely held that the Bush administration had no independent policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict except that was formulated by Sharon, who is now in comatose. Ehud Olmert, Sharon's successor as acting prime minister, and the Sharon-founded Kadima party are following the same policy, and hence there is little chance of a breakthrough, particularly given that the Hamas group has taken over the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) after winning January elections.
As to Iraq, all one needs to be reminded of is Bush's recent statement that his successor as US president would have to decide on withdrawing the US military from that country.
As to Iran, the file remains open. The argument remains strong in Washington circles that Iran's nuclear programme is a threat to vital US interests and hence military action against the Iranians is indeed an option.
The neoconservative camp, which orchestrated the political, diplomatic and military build-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, is deemed to be slowly disintegrating, with its influence and power weakening against the "realist" course spearheaded by Rice and her confidants like Deputy Secretary Robert Zoellick and Under-Secretary for Policy Nicholas Burns.
Away from the corridors of power and influence in Washington are neocons and their supporters like Paul Wolfowitz, Douglas Feith, John Bolton, Carl Rove, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Richard Perle, who had to step down as chairman of the Defence Policy Board, Michael Ledeen and several others who have been closely involved in preparing the grounds for the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
They were all linked together in a network that was led by the Foundation for the Defence of Democracies and included the American Enterprise Institute, the Centre for Security Policy, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and the Committee on the Present Danger.
Most of the neocons have close ties with Israel's right-wing Likud Party, and ardent lobbyists for the Jewish state. They are accused of orchestrating the war against Iraq in order to serve Israel's interests (since Iraq, despite being weakened following the 1991 war over Kuwait, posed the strongest challenge to the Jewish state and Saddam Hussein was a strong supporter of the Palestinians).
The neoconservatives' decline in power was seen to have started in early 2004, when it became abundantly clear that they had failed to forsee an insurgency in Iraq and then they did not have any effective solutions to counter it when it gathered strength.
However, it was not until Bush was re-elected for a second term in October 2004 that they were slowly pushed out but not in disgrace. To sideline them before the elections would have meant Bush was admitting that he had failed in his objectives in Iraq and this would have had an impact on his re-election chances.
Wolfowitz was made president of the World Bank; Feith resigned as deputy defence secretary; Bolton was sent to the UN as the US ambassador to the world body; Libby had to quit as the chief of staff of Vice-President Dick Cheney and Rove had to leave the White House in a scandal linked to the outing of an undercover Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) operative.
Indeed, Cheney and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, often called the "real brains" behind the Iraq war, remain very much in power.
However, Rice and her "realist" camp are edging out the neoconservative influence and ideology — essentially based on a military approach to solving problems — from the administration, according to experts in Washington.
"Demoralised by the quagmire in Iraq, as well as President George W. Bush's still falling approval and credibility ratings, the coalition of aggressive nationalists, neoconservatives, and the Christian Right that promoted the belligerent, neo-imperial trajectory in US foreign policy has lost both its coherence and its power to dominate the political agenda here," writes Jim Lobe on www.antiwar.com.
"As a result — and almost by default — realists under Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and in the uniformed military have steadily gained control over the administration's policy," according to Lobe.
Rice's recent admission that the US had made "thousands" of "tactical" mistakes in Iraq was taken as an implicit hit at the neocons, who appeared to have expected the people of Iraq to embrace the American military as their liberators and ready to start a new life under American directions after the ouster of Saddam Hussein.
In the meantime, Rice is going ahead with the "realist" policy, which puts a greater emphasis on diplomacy, says Lobe, who refers to "The National Security Strategy of the United States of America," released in March.
He describes the document as a "kinder, gentler version of its fire-breathing 2002 predecessor that laid out the doctrinal justification for the March 2003 invasion." He asserts that "the new version puts a greater emphasis on diplomacy and development, tending alliances, and other realist themes, even as it continues the administration's defense of preemptive military action with Iran squarely in mind."
Rice's constant travel — as well as that of Zoellick and Burns — "not only demonstrates the priority the administration has placed on cultivating allies and even states more sceptical of US benevolence. It also suggests that the State Department — the bastion of foreign policy realism — is considerably more confident of its own power within the administration."
How does the shift in Washington affect prospects for peace in the Middle East?
Not much, experts say. President Bush is committed to supporting Israel's unilateral moves and has in fact signed a document affirming his endorsement of Sharon's plans to annex parts of the West Bank and his refusal to recognise the right of the Palestinian refugees to return to their pre-1948 homes in what is now Israel.
It is widely held that the Bush administration had no independent policy towards the Israeli-Palestinian conflict except that was formulated by Sharon, who is now in comatose. Ehud Olmert, Sharon's successor as acting prime minister, and the Sharon-founded Kadima party are following the same policy, and hence there is little chance of a breakthrough, particularly given that the Hamas group has taken over the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) after winning January elections.
As to Iraq, all one needs to be reminded of is Bush's recent statement that his successor as US president would have to decide on withdrawing the US military from that country.
As to Iran, the file remains open. The argument remains strong in Washington circles that Iran's nuclear programme is a threat to vital US interests and hence military action against the Iranians is indeed an option.
April 18 US firms take Iraq for a ride
American companies have cheated post-war Iraq of more than $20 billion in unfufilled contracts and deals that existed on paper with help from the American government, according to details available in US official reports.
However, Iraq has no way of recovering the money because the companies involved have been given legal "immunity." The immunity was given by Paul Bremer, who ruled post-Saddam Hussein Iraq until June 28, 2004 when he handed over the charge to a temporary Iraqi government. The immunity says no American company could be taken to court by the Iraqi government for work done in Iraq under contracts given by Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA).
According to reports and auditing findings by official agencies of the US government, Bremer, who was in control of $20.5 billion of Iraqi money in an account called the Development Fund for Iraq, signed away hundreds of contracts in the months before he left Iraq in June 2004.
The Development Fund for Iraq held money that came from Iraq's oil exports.
The contracts signed by Bremer covered rebuilding roads, bridges, schools, hospitals, power and communication stations, and even garbage collection. However, American auditors found that less than 10 per cent of the contracts were actually carried out and the rest of the contracts existed only on paper, with Bremer's CPA having already paid the entire contract money in advance.
The auditing was conducted by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, a temporary office set up by Congress to oversee the use of reconstruction funds. The inspector-general found that out of 198 separate contracts, 154 contracts contained no evidence that goods or services promised by contractors were ever received.
The auditing also found that in some cases, contractors were paid twice for the same job. In others cases, they were paid for work that was never done.
Halliburton, in which US Vice-President Dick Cheney holds stakes, was given a no-tender, direct contract to restore Iraq's oil infrastructure worth $2.4 billion. No work was ever done.
Some of these companies were also involved in direct contracts given by the US military and here also they were found to have cheated the US military. Cases related to such cases are being tried in US courts, but there is no case involving actual Iraqi money.
Indeed, there is law in the US called the False Claims Act, However, it only protects the US government from fraud. It holds that the United States suffered no direct economic loss from fraud involving Iraqi money and therefore the False Claims Act could not be applied in cases involving Iraqi money. That saves Bremer, his associates and all others, including the contractors, from prosecution for misapproprating Iraqi money.
Here are some examples of the fraud uncovered by the US special inspector general.
Only $498 million of the approximately $1.5 billion in cash given to Iraqi banks for government operating expenses can be accounted for.
Halliburton overcharged $218 million on a contract to import fuel and repair oil fields, for which the US company was paid $1.6 billion in Iraqi oil proceeds.
One US official was given a week to spend $6.75 million in cash before Bremer handed over the country to the interim Iraqi government on June 28 2004, when the money would revert to Iraqi control.
Bremer gave more than $8 billion in cash to Iraqi ministries that had no internal controls to handle such an influx, and significant amounts appeared to be paid to ''ghost employees."
However, Iraq has no way of recovering the money because the companies involved have been given legal "immunity." The immunity was given by Paul Bremer, who ruled post-Saddam Hussein Iraq until June 28, 2004 when he handed over the charge to a temporary Iraqi government. The immunity says no American company could be taken to court by the Iraqi government for work done in Iraq under contracts given by Bremer's Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA).
According to reports and auditing findings by official agencies of the US government, Bremer, who was in control of $20.5 billion of Iraqi money in an account called the Development Fund for Iraq, signed away hundreds of contracts in the months before he left Iraq in June 2004.
The Development Fund for Iraq held money that came from Iraq's oil exports.
The contracts signed by Bremer covered rebuilding roads, bridges, schools, hospitals, power and communication stations, and even garbage collection. However, American auditors found that less than 10 per cent of the contracts were actually carried out and the rest of the contracts existed only on paper, with Bremer's CPA having already paid the entire contract money in advance.
The auditing was conducted by the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, a temporary office set up by Congress to oversee the use of reconstruction funds. The inspector-general found that out of 198 separate contracts, 154 contracts contained no evidence that goods or services promised by contractors were ever received.
The auditing also found that in some cases, contractors were paid twice for the same job. In others cases, they were paid for work that was never done.
Halliburton, in which US Vice-President Dick Cheney holds stakes, was given a no-tender, direct contract to restore Iraq's oil infrastructure worth $2.4 billion. No work was ever done.
Some of these companies were also involved in direct contracts given by the US military and here also they were found to have cheated the US military. Cases related to such cases are being tried in US courts, but there is no case involving actual Iraqi money.
Indeed, there is law in the US called the False Claims Act, However, it only protects the US government from fraud. It holds that the United States suffered no direct economic loss from fraud involving Iraqi money and therefore the False Claims Act could not be applied in cases involving Iraqi money. That saves Bremer, his associates and all others, including the contractors, from prosecution for misapproprating Iraqi money.
Here are some examples of the fraud uncovered by the US special inspector general.
Only $498 million of the approximately $1.5 billion in cash given to Iraqi banks for government operating expenses can be accounted for.
Halliburton overcharged $218 million on a contract to import fuel and repair oil fields, for which the US company was paid $1.6 billion in Iraqi oil proceeds.
One US official was given a week to spend $6.75 million in cash before Bremer handed over the country to the interim Iraqi government on June 28 2004, when the money would revert to Iraqi control.
Bremer gave more than $8 billion in cash to Iraqi ministries that had no internal controls to handle such an influx, and significant amounts appeared to be paid to ''ghost employees."
A new liberation?
'Inad Khairallah
THE "second liberation of Baghdad" — that is what seems to be happening in the Iraqi capital, with American soldiers and Shiite militiamen who have joined government security forces carrying out what is intended to be elimination of not only jihadist insurgents but also others deemed sympathetic to the insurgency, mainly from the Sunni community.
The term "second liberation of Baghdad" was coined by the US military and cited in a recent report appearing in London's Sunday Times.
"The battle for Baghdad is expected to entail a 'carrot-and-stick' approach, offering the beleaguered population protection from sectarian violence in exchange for rooting out insurgent groups and Al Qaeda," said the report filed by Sarah Baxter from Washington.
The paper quoted sources as saying Iraqi forces would take the lead in the operation, supported by American air power, special operations, intelligence, embedded officers and back-up troops.
While the Sunday Times report said the "second liberation" was to come after a new government was installed in Baghdad, reports from the ground in the Iraqi capital indicate that the operation could be already under way.
News agencies have reported that "insurgents" were mounting attacks on Iraqi security forces in the Adhamiya neighbourhood of Baghdad and this had led to open street battles. Most of these reported quoted US military statements as their sources.
A news agency reported on Tuesday: "A US military spokesman said 50 insurgents attacked Iraqi forces in a seven-hour battle early on
Tuesday that killed five rebels and wounded an Iraqi soldier.
"Fighting was so fierce that US reinforcements were brought in to the northern district, home to some of Iraq's most hard-core Sunni guerrillas and the Abu Hanifa mosque, near where Saddam Hussein was last seen in public before going into hiding."
The report quoted masked Sunni Arab insurgents as saying that they were gearing up for "another open street battle with pro-government Shiite militiamen."
Dahr Jamail, an independent journalist who writes exclusive reports for web sites, provided a clearer picture of what is actually happening, and his version shows that the operation is undertaken jointly by the US military and Iraqi security forces — Shiite militiamen of the Badr Brigade who dominate the ministry of interior fighting force as well as members of the Mahdi Army of firebrand Shiite leader Motqada Sadr.
It is not a matter of "insurgents" attacking government security forces, according to Jamail, but a concerted campaign of assault mounted by Shiite militiamen in the Sunni area and supported by American soldiers.
In an article appearing on truthout.com, Jamail, who writes that there had been clashes every day for four days leading to Monday night's huge clash in the Adhamiya district of Baghdad.
Jamail quotes his sources in Baghdad as saying that fighters from the Badr Brigade and Sadr's Mehdi Army have been launching ongoing attacks against Sunnis in Adhamiya and the local residents were resisting the assaults.
According to the sources, residents of Adhamiya close access roads every night with tyres, trunks of date palm trees, and other objects to prevent "kidnappers and Shiite death squads" from entering the area.
Monday night's attack was "different from the other nights in quantity and quality; it was truly like the hell which I haven't seen even in the battles of the war between Iraq and Iran during the eighties," says the source.
Those mounting the attack wore uniforms representing special forces from the ministry of interior, the account said.
"When the uniformed forces entered the neighbourhood, the National Guards that are usually patrolling the streets left," Jamail quotes a resident as saying. "Young armed men from the neighbourhood fought side by side with mujahedeen against the attacking forces to protect Al Adhamiya. Several residents have been killed in the streets, but there are currently no figures available. US troops also entered the neighbourhood At first, they only stood by and watched; later on they, too, fired at the locals, who tried to repel the attacks. Later in the day, rumours circulated that another fierce attack of Al Adhamiya is planned on Wednesday, but … couldn't confirm this information."
The US military would only say that "gunmen clashed with residents in Baghdad's Adhamiya district."
The area remained sealed off on Wednesday.
Western reporters speculated on Wednesday that the resistance put up by Adhamiya residents against the militiamen — who are nicknamed "death squads" because they kidnap, torture and murder Sunnis — was an indication of their growing support for the insurgency.
Few reporters seem to bother to consider that the residents of the area are fighting for their life. The intruders' goal is clear: They want to kidnap prominent Sunnis from the area and murder them and dump their bodies somewhere. Therefore, it is natural that the Sunnis would put up the toughest of resistance.
At the same time, the reported role of the US military in the assault, if proved accurate, suggests that it could indeed be part of the "second liberation" of Baghdad.
The Sunday Times quotes Daniel Gouré, a Pentagon adviser and vice-president of the Lexington Institute, a military think tank, as referring to the formation of a new Iraqi government as a “second liberation of Baghdad,”
“The new government will be able to claim it is taking back the streets," he says.
According to the Sunday Times report, US and Iraqi forces will be moving from one neighbourhood to the other, leaving behind Sweat teams — "sewage, water, electricity and trash” — to work on upgrading clinics, schools, rubbish collection, water and electricity supplies.
The first target for the campaign will be what the US military describes as Sunni insurgent strongholds — Al Adhamiya could now be qualified to be described as such — moving later on to the Shiite armed groups, including Sadr's Mahdi Army and Badr Brigade.
The contradiction here is the reported alliance involving the US military, the Sadr forces and the Badr Brigade.
One thing is clear: The US military cannot afford to have the Mahdi Army and Badr Brigade running amok in Baghdad or anywhere else in Iraq. They have a record of targeting Sunnis and, given Washington's avowed concern to restore "national unity" to Iraq, the US military could not be seen as supporting the groups in assaults against the Sunnis.
At the same time, it is indeed a priority of the US to show that the American force in Iraq is in control and this requires a massive "house-to-house and area-to-area" cleansing. The US military does not have even a quarter of the number of soldiers required for an efficient and effective "cleansing" present in Iraq.
Perhaps, the US strategy is to let the Shiite forces take the lead and offer support for them from the periphery before turning against the Shiites themselves.
Well, by then, however, the US military would find out that they have created a monster whom they could not fight no matter how many rounds of "liberation" they are willing to undertake, whether in Baghdad or other towns of post-war Iraq
THE "second liberation of Baghdad" — that is what seems to be happening in the Iraqi capital, with American soldiers and Shiite militiamen who have joined government security forces carrying out what is intended to be elimination of not only jihadist insurgents but also others deemed sympathetic to the insurgency, mainly from the Sunni community.
The term "second liberation of Baghdad" was coined by the US military and cited in a recent report appearing in London's Sunday Times.
"The battle for Baghdad is expected to entail a 'carrot-and-stick' approach, offering the beleaguered population protection from sectarian violence in exchange for rooting out insurgent groups and Al Qaeda," said the report filed by Sarah Baxter from Washington.
The paper quoted sources as saying Iraqi forces would take the lead in the operation, supported by American air power, special operations, intelligence, embedded officers and back-up troops.
While the Sunday Times report said the "second liberation" was to come after a new government was installed in Baghdad, reports from the ground in the Iraqi capital indicate that the operation could be already under way.
News agencies have reported that "insurgents" were mounting attacks on Iraqi security forces in the Adhamiya neighbourhood of Baghdad and this had led to open street battles. Most of these reported quoted US military statements as their sources.
A news agency reported on Tuesday: "A US military spokesman said 50 insurgents attacked Iraqi forces in a seven-hour battle early on
Tuesday that killed five rebels and wounded an Iraqi soldier.
"Fighting was so fierce that US reinforcements were brought in to the northern district, home to some of Iraq's most hard-core Sunni guerrillas and the Abu Hanifa mosque, near where Saddam Hussein was last seen in public before going into hiding."
The report quoted masked Sunni Arab insurgents as saying that they were gearing up for "another open street battle with pro-government Shiite militiamen."
Dahr Jamail, an independent journalist who writes exclusive reports for web sites, provided a clearer picture of what is actually happening, and his version shows that the operation is undertaken jointly by the US military and Iraqi security forces — Shiite militiamen of the Badr Brigade who dominate the ministry of interior fighting force as well as members of the Mahdi Army of firebrand Shiite leader Motqada Sadr.
It is not a matter of "insurgents" attacking government security forces, according to Jamail, but a concerted campaign of assault mounted by Shiite militiamen in the Sunni area and supported by American soldiers.
In an article appearing on truthout.com, Jamail, who writes that there had been clashes every day for four days leading to Monday night's huge clash in the Adhamiya district of Baghdad.
Jamail quotes his sources in Baghdad as saying that fighters from the Badr Brigade and Sadr's Mehdi Army have been launching ongoing attacks against Sunnis in Adhamiya and the local residents were resisting the assaults.
According to the sources, residents of Adhamiya close access roads every night with tyres, trunks of date palm trees, and other objects to prevent "kidnappers and Shiite death squads" from entering the area.
Monday night's attack was "different from the other nights in quantity and quality; it was truly like the hell which I haven't seen even in the battles of the war between Iraq and Iran during the eighties," says the source.
Those mounting the attack wore uniforms representing special forces from the ministry of interior, the account said.
"When the uniformed forces entered the neighbourhood, the National Guards that are usually patrolling the streets left," Jamail quotes a resident as saying. "Young armed men from the neighbourhood fought side by side with mujahedeen against the attacking forces to protect Al Adhamiya. Several residents have been killed in the streets, but there are currently no figures available. US troops also entered the neighbourhood At first, they only stood by and watched; later on they, too, fired at the locals, who tried to repel the attacks. Later in the day, rumours circulated that another fierce attack of Al Adhamiya is planned on Wednesday, but … couldn't confirm this information."
The US military would only say that "gunmen clashed with residents in Baghdad's Adhamiya district."
The area remained sealed off on Wednesday.
Western reporters speculated on Wednesday that the resistance put up by Adhamiya residents against the militiamen — who are nicknamed "death squads" because they kidnap, torture and murder Sunnis — was an indication of their growing support for the insurgency.
Few reporters seem to bother to consider that the residents of the area are fighting for their life. The intruders' goal is clear: They want to kidnap prominent Sunnis from the area and murder them and dump their bodies somewhere. Therefore, it is natural that the Sunnis would put up the toughest of resistance.
At the same time, the reported role of the US military in the assault, if proved accurate, suggests that it could indeed be part of the "second liberation" of Baghdad.
The Sunday Times quotes Daniel Gouré, a Pentagon adviser and vice-president of the Lexington Institute, a military think tank, as referring to the formation of a new Iraqi government as a “second liberation of Baghdad,”
“The new government will be able to claim it is taking back the streets," he says.
According to the Sunday Times report, US and Iraqi forces will be moving from one neighbourhood to the other, leaving behind Sweat teams — "sewage, water, electricity and trash” — to work on upgrading clinics, schools, rubbish collection, water and electricity supplies.
The first target for the campaign will be what the US military describes as Sunni insurgent strongholds — Al Adhamiya could now be qualified to be described as such — moving later on to the Shiite armed groups, including Sadr's Mahdi Army and Badr Brigade.
The contradiction here is the reported alliance involving the US military, the Sadr forces and the Badr Brigade.
One thing is clear: The US military cannot afford to have the Mahdi Army and Badr Brigade running amok in Baghdad or anywhere else in Iraq. They have a record of targeting Sunnis and, given Washington's avowed concern to restore "national unity" to Iraq, the US military could not be seen as supporting the groups in assaults against the Sunnis.
At the same time, it is indeed a priority of the US to show that the American force in Iraq is in control and this requires a massive "house-to-house and area-to-area" cleansing. The US military does not have even a quarter of the number of soldiers required for an efficient and effective "cleansing" present in Iraq.
Perhaps, the US strategy is to let the Shiite forces take the lead and offer support for them from the periphery before turning against the Shiites themselves.
Well, by then, however, the US military would find out that they have created a monster whom they could not fight no matter how many rounds of "liberation" they are willing to undertake, whether in Baghdad or other towns of post-war Iraq
April 26 Israel's game
'Inad Khairallah
ISRAEL and its supporters want the US to wage war in order to serve Israeli interests and help advance the Jewish state's quest for regional supremacy and expansionism, but they do not want the US government to state it publicly because it could damage Israel's "strategic relationship" with the US.
There is no longer any ambiguity over the reality that one of the key reasons that the US invaded and occupied Iraq was to eliminate the Saddam Hussein regime as a potential threat to the Jewish state and to advance Israel's strategic objectives in the region. Similarly, any action that the US might take against Iran would also have a strong Israeli element.
As reports from Washington indicate, the pro-Israeli camp, many of whose members are leaders of the neoconservative movement, has been beating the drums of war against Iran despite reservations voiced by military strategists who fear a fierce backlash, directly or indirectly or both, if the US were to launch military strikes against Iran.
The American society at large could not but be aware that more than 2,300 American soldiers have died and more than 18,000 others have been crippled — most of them rendered invalid for life — in the Iraq war.
That awareness, coupled with the realisation that the Iraq war was waged in the name of non-existent threats to American national security, is fuelling American public anger and raising serious questions about why the US had to wage war against Iraq.
Simply put, there are increasing voices in the US that the invasion of Iraq was an Israeli war fought by the US military and that the Bush administration is being prodded into taking military action against Iran by the pro-Israeli camp.
It is almost certain that the backlash from military strikes against Iran would be in terms of American lives as well as oil prices (imagine $6 a gallon of petrol at fuel stations in the US). On both counts, the American public would react forcefully, and one of the targets would be the American-Israeli relationship.
Obviously, Israel and its powerful lobby in the US know that the relationship would not stand public scrutiny. Their best option is to avoid focus on the reality that Washington's approach to the Middle East is aimed at serving Israeli interests more than that of the US itself. The more the awareness of the truth the greater the opposition to the almost unlimited political, military, financial and diplomatic support that the US extends to Israel, and this could have serious, long-term implications for the dominating influence the pro-Israeli lobby exercises in the corridors of power politics in Washington.
Israel and its supporters fear a popular backlash at the Bush administration first and then at the "strategic relationship" between the US and Israel if President George Bush were to cite Israel as his top rationale for possible US military conflict with Iran and other moves in the region.
Instead of playing down the Israeli link but going ahead with considering military options anyway, Bush, by oversight, design or coincidence, has been repeatedly mentioning that Iran's nuclear programme was a threat primarily to Israel rather than international stability.
Indeed, Bush seemed to have been prompted into referring to the Israeli link by the rhetoric coming from Iranian President Ahmedinejad, who has said that Israel should be "wiped off the map" and described the Holocaust as a myth.
“Now that I’m on Iran … the threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel," Bush told a recent gathering in Cleveland. "It’s a threat to world peace; it’s a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I’ll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel.”
Among the first to take note of the "danger and risk" inherent in the Bush administration's proclamations was Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations. “The linkage to Israel is not a good idea, because then the Iranians say, you see, it’s the Zionists driving this," he said. “As much as we appreciate it, the question is whether it’s beneficial to tie this to Israel” (www.thejewishweek.com).
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations functions as the Jewish community’s official umbrella group in the US for speaking out on foreign policy issues.
Indeed, the Jewish lobby in Washington has already been rattled.
A study published by two respected academicians and analysts, John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard, has triggered a new debate on the US-Israeli relationship.
The study states that the "Israel Lobby" has exerted such a disproportionate influence that it has consistently steered the US away from pursuing its national interest. The study cites specific evidence of the lobby's influence on US policymakers. It also highlights how the lobby pre-empts any free and open discussion on US-Israel relations by attaching an "anti-Semitic" label on anyone who dares question the relationship.
While the authors have come under bitter attack from the pro-Israeli camp, the point they made has not been lost on many Americans, particularly that the US has placed Israel's interests above its own and that the Bush administration led the country into a disastrous misadventure in Iraq and made itself the object of Arab and Muslim anger and the target of terrorism.
They affirm that there is no practical, moral or strategic ground to justify the support that the US is extending to Israel.
Add to that the more than $300 billion that the US has spent on the various fronts of its self-proclaimed war against terror which includes the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. It is estimated that every American child and adult has spent $1,250 (tax payments not included) in the war against terror that was launched after the Sept.11, 2001 attacks.
Even the Israeli media are playing down the Bush administration's pointed reference to the Israeli link in the confrontation with Iran over Tehran's nuclear programmes. They must indeed be aware that it is counter-productive to US-Israeli relations even in the short term.
One of the measures adopted by the pro-Israelis in the US to fight off the damaging argument is to declare that the US has to strike at Iran in order to pre-empt Israeli action against the Iranians. That is propagated by Vice-President Dick Cheney.
“One of the concerns people have is that Israel might (attack Iran) without being asked,” said Cheney in February 2005, “that if, in fact, the Israelis became convinced the Iranians had significant nuclear capability, given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards.”
However, whatever way the cookie crumbles, the US-Israeli relationship could be facing the worse mess ever in the aftermath of American military action against Iran, that could present the best opportunity yet for the Arab and Muslim world to correct their media-distorted picture with the people of the United States.
ISRAEL and its supporters want the US to wage war in order to serve Israeli interests and help advance the Jewish state's quest for regional supremacy and expansionism, but they do not want the US government to state it publicly because it could damage Israel's "strategic relationship" with the US.
There is no longer any ambiguity over the reality that one of the key reasons that the US invaded and occupied Iraq was to eliminate the Saddam Hussein regime as a potential threat to the Jewish state and to advance Israel's strategic objectives in the region. Similarly, any action that the US might take against Iran would also have a strong Israeli element.
As reports from Washington indicate, the pro-Israeli camp, many of whose members are leaders of the neoconservative movement, has been beating the drums of war against Iran despite reservations voiced by military strategists who fear a fierce backlash, directly or indirectly or both, if the US were to launch military strikes against Iran.
The American society at large could not but be aware that more than 2,300 American soldiers have died and more than 18,000 others have been crippled — most of them rendered invalid for life — in the Iraq war.
That awareness, coupled with the realisation that the Iraq war was waged in the name of non-existent threats to American national security, is fuelling American public anger and raising serious questions about why the US had to wage war against Iraq.
Simply put, there are increasing voices in the US that the invasion of Iraq was an Israeli war fought by the US military and that the Bush administration is being prodded into taking military action against Iran by the pro-Israeli camp.
It is almost certain that the backlash from military strikes against Iran would be in terms of American lives as well as oil prices (imagine $6 a gallon of petrol at fuel stations in the US). On both counts, the American public would react forcefully, and one of the targets would be the American-Israeli relationship.
Obviously, Israel and its powerful lobby in the US know that the relationship would not stand public scrutiny. Their best option is to avoid focus on the reality that Washington's approach to the Middle East is aimed at serving Israeli interests more than that of the US itself. The more the awareness of the truth the greater the opposition to the almost unlimited political, military, financial and diplomatic support that the US extends to Israel, and this could have serious, long-term implications for the dominating influence the pro-Israeli lobby exercises in the corridors of power politics in Washington.
Israel and its supporters fear a popular backlash at the Bush administration first and then at the "strategic relationship" between the US and Israel if President George Bush were to cite Israel as his top rationale for possible US military conflict with Iran and other moves in the region.
Instead of playing down the Israeli link but going ahead with considering military options anyway, Bush, by oversight, design or coincidence, has been repeatedly mentioning that Iran's nuclear programme was a threat primarily to Israel rather than international stability.
Indeed, Bush seemed to have been prompted into referring to the Israeli link by the rhetoric coming from Iranian President Ahmedinejad, who has said that Israel should be "wiped off the map" and described the Holocaust as a myth.
“Now that I’m on Iran … the threat from Iran is, of course, their stated objective to destroy our strong ally Israel," Bush told a recent gathering in Cleveland. "It’s a threat to world peace; it’s a threat, in essence, to a strong alliance. I made it clear, I’ll make it clear again, that we will use military might to protect our ally, Israel.”
Among the first to take note of the "danger and risk" inherent in the Bush administration's proclamations was Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations. “The linkage to Israel is not a good idea, because then the Iranians say, you see, it’s the Zionists driving this," he said. “As much as we appreciate it, the question is whether it’s beneficial to tie this to Israel” (www.thejewishweek.com).
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations functions as the Jewish community’s official umbrella group in the US for speaking out on foreign policy issues.
Indeed, the Jewish lobby in Washington has already been rattled.
A study published by two respected academicians and analysts, John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of Harvard, has triggered a new debate on the US-Israeli relationship.
The study states that the "Israel Lobby" has exerted such a disproportionate influence that it has consistently steered the US away from pursuing its national interest. The study cites specific evidence of the lobby's influence on US policymakers. It also highlights how the lobby pre-empts any free and open discussion on US-Israel relations by attaching an "anti-Semitic" label on anyone who dares question the relationship.
While the authors have come under bitter attack from the pro-Israeli camp, the point they made has not been lost on many Americans, particularly that the US has placed Israel's interests above its own and that the Bush administration led the country into a disastrous misadventure in Iraq and made itself the object of Arab and Muslim anger and the target of terrorism.
They affirm that there is no practical, moral or strategic ground to justify the support that the US is extending to Israel.
Add to that the more than $300 billion that the US has spent on the various fronts of its self-proclaimed war against terror which includes the invasion and occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq. It is estimated that every American child and adult has spent $1,250 (tax payments not included) in the war against terror that was launched after the Sept.11, 2001 attacks.
Even the Israeli media are playing down the Bush administration's pointed reference to the Israeli link in the confrontation with Iran over Tehran's nuclear programmes. They must indeed be aware that it is counter-productive to US-Israeli relations even in the short term.
One of the measures adopted by the pro-Israelis in the US to fight off the damaging argument is to declare that the US has to strike at Iran in order to pre-empt Israeli action against the Iranians. That is propagated by Vice-President Dick Cheney.
“One of the concerns people have is that Israel might (attack Iran) without being asked,” said Cheney in February 2005, “that if, in fact, the Israelis became convinced the Iranians had significant nuclear capability, given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards.”
However, whatever way the cookie crumbles, the US-Israeli relationship could be facing the worse mess ever in the aftermath of American military action against Iran, that could present the best opportunity yet for the Arab and Muslim world to correct their media-distorted picture with the people of the United States.
April 17 Ball in US court
The ball is in Washington
EVERYONE in Palestine is issuing warning and threats. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has publicly warned the Hamas group that he has the authority to bring down their government and urged it to renounce armed resistance, recognise Israel and accept the agreements that the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) has signed with the Jewish state so that he could seek to relaunch peace talks.
Hamas responded that it would "not leave in silence" and that it reserved the option to call off a truce with Israel that Abbas brokered in February 2005. The group also warned that it would not "recognise "the Palestinian political regime," and would not participate in any new election.
On its part, Israel has warned that it would step up military action against Palestinians firing rockets at Israeli towns from across the Gaza border. It said it could not be bothered with any Hamas talk about the February 2005 truce because, as Israeli officials claimed, the group did not recognise it in the first place. That was indeed sidestepping the truth that Hamas has largely respected the truce and has not involved itself in any suicide bombings since February last year.
Each party involved in the round of warnings and threats has own considerations.
Abbas is frustrated that Hamas is continuing to hold out against meeting the minimum requirements for resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiation (not that there is any guarantee that the exercise would produce results that would be positive for the Palestinians). He is also worried that the cash crisis facing the PNA is creating more and more resentment and anger among the Palestinian people and this could lead to breeding more radicalism in the occupied territories.
Hamas is speaking from a position of strength. It believes that the impressive victory it secured in the January elections has made it the legitimate representative of a majority of the Palestinian people as opposed to Abbas's Fatah or even the broader Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO).
Israel also believes it is speaking from a position of strength. Hamas continuing in power suits Israel's short-term interests because Israel could plead to the world that it does not have a negotiating partner for peace and press ahead with its unilateral plans to set its "final borders" without Palestinian involvement.
In the meantime, Israel could always retaliate for rocket attacks by lobbing missiles at Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. It is not concerned whether the attacks kill Palestinian civilians since it could always cite self-defence for any action it undertakes.
Against these ground realities, the only course of events is towards a worsening of the situation, and the only party which could make a difference is the US. We could only hope that Washington strategists realise that it would be against US interests if the Middle East region slips further into instability and act before it is too late to correct their approach to the region.
EVERYONE in Palestine is issuing warning and threats. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has publicly warned the Hamas group that he has the authority to bring down their government and urged it to renounce armed resistance, recognise Israel and accept the agreements that the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) has signed with the Jewish state so that he could seek to relaunch peace talks.
Hamas responded that it would "not leave in silence" and that it reserved the option to call off a truce with Israel that Abbas brokered in February 2005. The group also warned that it would not "recognise "the Palestinian political regime," and would not participate in any new election.
On its part, Israel has warned that it would step up military action against Palestinians firing rockets at Israeli towns from across the Gaza border. It said it could not be bothered with any Hamas talk about the February 2005 truce because, as Israeli officials claimed, the group did not recognise it in the first place. That was indeed sidestepping the truth that Hamas has largely respected the truce and has not involved itself in any suicide bombings since February last year.
Each party involved in the round of warnings and threats has own considerations.
Abbas is frustrated that Hamas is continuing to hold out against meeting the minimum requirements for resumption of the Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiation (not that there is any guarantee that the exercise would produce results that would be positive for the Palestinians). He is also worried that the cash crisis facing the PNA is creating more and more resentment and anger among the Palestinian people and this could lead to breeding more radicalism in the occupied territories.
Hamas is speaking from a position of strength. It believes that the impressive victory it secured in the January elections has made it the legitimate representative of a majority of the Palestinian people as opposed to Abbas's Fatah or even the broader Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO).
Israel also believes it is speaking from a position of strength. Hamas continuing in power suits Israel's short-term interests because Israel could plead to the world that it does not have a negotiating partner for peace and press ahead with its unilateral plans to set its "final borders" without Palestinian involvement.
In the meantime, Israel could always retaliate for rocket attacks by lobbing missiles at Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. It is not concerned whether the attacks kill Palestinian civilians since it could always cite self-defence for any action it undertakes.
Against these ground realities, the only course of events is towards a worsening of the situation, and the only party which could make a difference is the US. We could only hope that Washington strategists realise that it would be against US interests if the Middle East region slips further into instability and act before it is too late to correct their approach to the region.
April 15 Afghan crisis
Firing under pressure
THE DEATH of Afghan civilians and policemen in operations carried out by the US military in the countryside — some of them in "friendly fire" incidents — highlight a new dimension to American activities in Afghanistan. There seems to be a frenzy for the US military to prove to show results of their operations in the country as the Pentagon has come under bitter criticism, with demands mounting for the resignation of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Rumsfeld has drawn fire for what his critics see as major shortcoming in planning the wars against Afghanistan as well as Iraq. In both cases, the US is far from realising its strategic and military goals , and it does not look like it would get any closer to the objectives in the short term.
In Afghanistan, the US military is combing areas near the border with Pakistan hunting for Al Qaeda guerrillas and allied Taliban fighters who melted away into the countryside by the time American soldiers could claim having taken over the country in late 2001. Strategic prizes of the invasion, Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar, eluded the wide American net along with close lieutenants.
Now they seem to be staging a comeback, with the frequency of their operations increasing every day in a deadly catch-me-if-you-can game.
In response, up to 2,500 US, British and Afghan forces last week launched Operation Mountain Lion aimed at flushing out Taleban-led militants assumed to be behind the recent upsurge in attacks. It is described as s the biggest joint operation since the Taleban were driven from power in 2001.
As the coalition forces battle it out in Afghanistan, the US is also finding itself getting more and more dragged into the crisis in Iraq, which is showing no signs of being contained. If anything, it is worsening and reports clearly indicate that it is all but a civil conflict in name in the beleaguered country, as military experts and analysts argue.
On Friday, according to reports, "friendly fire" killed six Afghan policemen in southern Kandahar province during a battle between US soldiers and militants.
On Saturday, seven civilians died during a battle with insurgents in the eastern province of Kunar when US airplanes and artillery carried out a blanket bombing of a militant-infected area.
Both incidents are under investigation. The details of who fired what, how and when are expected to be uncovered by the time the inquiries are over. What might not be made known to the public would be the fact that so much pressure was brought to bear upon the American commanders and soldiers that they were prompted into firing first and asking questions later because they had to produce physical results of their operations in Afghanistan. The pressure would only get more intense in the days and weeks ahead as Washington seeks to counter mounting criticism, and that would mean stepped-up search-and-kill operations that would inevitably lead to more "friendly fire" incidents and civilian deaths.
THE DEATH of Afghan civilians and policemen in operations carried out by the US military in the countryside — some of them in "friendly fire" incidents — highlight a new dimension to American activities in Afghanistan. There seems to be a frenzy for the US military to prove to show results of their operations in the country as the Pentagon has come under bitter criticism, with demands mounting for the resignation of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Rumsfeld has drawn fire for what his critics see as major shortcoming in planning the wars against Afghanistan as well as Iraq. In both cases, the US is far from realising its strategic and military goals , and it does not look like it would get any closer to the objectives in the short term.
In Afghanistan, the US military is combing areas near the border with Pakistan hunting for Al Qaeda guerrillas and allied Taliban fighters who melted away into the countryside by the time American soldiers could claim having taken over the country in late 2001. Strategic prizes of the invasion, Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar, eluded the wide American net along with close lieutenants.
Now they seem to be staging a comeback, with the frequency of their operations increasing every day in a deadly catch-me-if-you-can game.
In response, up to 2,500 US, British and Afghan forces last week launched Operation Mountain Lion aimed at flushing out Taleban-led militants assumed to be behind the recent upsurge in attacks. It is described as s the biggest joint operation since the Taleban were driven from power in 2001.
As the coalition forces battle it out in Afghanistan, the US is also finding itself getting more and more dragged into the crisis in Iraq, which is showing no signs of being contained. If anything, it is worsening and reports clearly indicate that it is all but a civil conflict in name in the beleaguered country, as military experts and analysts argue.
On Friday, according to reports, "friendly fire" killed six Afghan policemen in southern Kandahar province during a battle between US soldiers and militants.
On Saturday, seven civilians died during a battle with insurgents in the eastern province of Kunar when US airplanes and artillery carried out a blanket bombing of a militant-infected area.
Both incidents are under investigation. The details of who fired what, how and when are expected to be uncovered by the time the inquiries are over. What might not be made known to the public would be the fact that so much pressure was brought to bear upon the American commanders and soldiers that they were prompted into firing first and asking questions later because they had to produce physical results of their operations in Afghanistan. The pressure would only get more intense in the days and weeks ahead as Washington seeks to counter mounting criticism, and that would mean stepped-up search-and-kill operations that would inevitably lead to more "friendly fire" incidents and civilian deaths.
Iraq militias a big US headache
Inad Khairallah
THE biggest challenge facing the US in Iraq today is how to dismantle the militia network that exists within the beleaguered country's security forces.
It might indeed be too late, for the militiamen have dug too deep into to the system to be rooted out. They represent the majority Shiite community and most of them belong to the Badr Brigade, the military arm of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). The brigade was supposed to have been dismantled and incorporated into post-war Iraq's security forces. Indeed, they have been incorporated into the security system, but not dismantled. They continue to take orders from the commander of the Badr Brigade. They dominate the interior ministry, and are said to be behind the daily abductions and killings of Sunnis.
Many see it as the Shiite way of exacting revenge from the Sunnis for the decades of oppression they suffered under the Saddam Hussein regime. Eliminating leading members of the Sunni community also serves the purpose depriving the sect of an effective voice in the country's politics.
Wearing interior ministry uniforms, they storm Sunni homes and take away men, whose bodies turn up somewhere the next day with clear signs that they were tortured before being killed.
The US military is unable to check the militiamen, for they represent the authority of the state.
Short of an open confrontation, the US military has no option to address the worsening situation, and taking on the Shiites is the last thing that Washington wants to do at this point in time.
The interior minister argues that the regular ministry force has nothing to do with the abductions and killings and blames "rogue" gunmen for the violence. The US military has no means to challenge the assertion. But both sides know it is a lie and that the other knows it to be so.
The situation is all the more alarming since the militiamen are headed by pro-Iranians, and this constrains the US options while dealing with Iran in the wider regional scene.
A US Defence Department report drawn up in February conceded that the security forces "may be more loyal to their political support organisation than to the central Iraqi government."
Apart from the Badr militiamen, the two other major armed groups in the country are Moqtada Sadr's Mahdi Army and the Kurdish Peshmerga.
Sadr's militiamen are in charge of security in and around the sprawling slums of Sadr City in Baghdad. They are also present in many parts of southern Iraq, including Najaf where they are in charge of protecting the senior-most Shiite leader in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani.
Moqtada Sadr, who is calling for an end to the US military presence in Iraq, is also a staunch pro-Iranian, but he is at odds with the SCIRI leadership.
Paul Bremer, who headed the US administration of Iraq shortly after the fall of Baghdad in 2003, had sensed the danger inherent in the militias. He had ordered the dismantling of all militias in the country and offered them an option of joining the post-war army.
However, caught in the middle of the security and political chaos that followed the invasion of Iraq, Bremer was unable to enforce the order, and today the US is facing an impossible situation.
It was yet another monumental mistake that the US committed in Iraq after the disbanding of the Sunni-dominated Iraqi army. Many former army soldiers are now believed to be actively engaged in the raging insurgency there. They have formed their own area units in order to protect the community from the Shiite militiamen.
Caught in the middle of the confrontation are ordinary Iraqis, both Shiites and Sunnis.
Thousands of families have been displaced from their villages. They had no choice to pack whatever belongings they had and leave their ancestral homes in the face of ultimatums served by local militiamen.
The displacement poses a major humanitarian crisis for the community as well as the government and voluntary relief agencies.
Many of the displaced are now housed in mosques in Baghdad and the capital's outskirts, and they live in a perpetual fear of being targeted for attack despite the sanctity of the mosque they live in.
The US strategists are now pinning hopes that a proposed joint committee made up of top officials from the interior ministry (headed by a Shiite) and the defence ministry (led by a Sunni) could be mandated with reining in the militiamen.
However, it would seem to be a pipedream because there is no compelling reason for anyone to sign on to the proposal.
Simply put, the majority Shiites are basking in their newfound domination of the Iraqi society and they would not be dissuaded by the US military or any other force except their political leadership.
The Sunnis are feeling the heat and they are determined to put up as much resistance as possible against efforts to impose fait accomplis on them. They may or may not accept American assurance of good faith, but they know that they could not expect the US military to protect them from the marauding militiamen.
The American hope of restoring order in Baghdad is pinned on formation of a government after months of political haggling following elections in December. However, there is no guarantee that the new government would be able to create enough confidence among Iraqis in the midst of continued abductions and killings.
Some suggest that a civil war is already under way. Others believe the worse is yet to come, and predict a disintegration of the country. Yet some others are convinced that Iraq could be put back on its feet if the US plays its cards right with its Iraqi and regional allies.
On the ground, however, the US faces the formidable task of removing the militiamen from the scene if it were to hope for pacifying the Sunnis. In the meantime, the country is slipping deeper and deeper into an abyss.
THE biggest challenge facing the US in Iraq today is how to dismantle the militia network that exists within the beleaguered country's security forces.
It might indeed be too late, for the militiamen have dug too deep into to the system to be rooted out. They represent the majority Shiite community and most of them belong to the Badr Brigade, the military arm of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI). The brigade was supposed to have been dismantled and incorporated into post-war Iraq's security forces. Indeed, they have been incorporated into the security system, but not dismantled. They continue to take orders from the commander of the Badr Brigade. They dominate the interior ministry, and are said to be behind the daily abductions and killings of Sunnis.
Many see it as the Shiite way of exacting revenge from the Sunnis for the decades of oppression they suffered under the Saddam Hussein regime. Eliminating leading members of the Sunni community also serves the purpose depriving the sect of an effective voice in the country's politics.
Wearing interior ministry uniforms, they storm Sunni homes and take away men, whose bodies turn up somewhere the next day with clear signs that they were tortured before being killed.
The US military is unable to check the militiamen, for they represent the authority of the state.
Short of an open confrontation, the US military has no option to address the worsening situation, and taking on the Shiites is the last thing that Washington wants to do at this point in time.
The interior minister argues that the regular ministry force has nothing to do with the abductions and killings and blames "rogue" gunmen for the violence. The US military has no means to challenge the assertion. But both sides know it is a lie and that the other knows it to be so.
The situation is all the more alarming since the militiamen are headed by pro-Iranians, and this constrains the US options while dealing with Iran in the wider regional scene.
A US Defence Department report drawn up in February conceded that the security forces "may be more loyal to their political support organisation than to the central Iraqi government."
Apart from the Badr militiamen, the two other major armed groups in the country are Moqtada Sadr's Mahdi Army and the Kurdish Peshmerga.
Sadr's militiamen are in charge of security in and around the sprawling slums of Sadr City in Baghdad. They are also present in many parts of southern Iraq, including Najaf where they are in charge of protecting the senior-most Shiite leader in Iraq, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani.
Moqtada Sadr, who is calling for an end to the US military presence in Iraq, is also a staunch pro-Iranian, but he is at odds with the SCIRI leadership.
Paul Bremer, who headed the US administration of Iraq shortly after the fall of Baghdad in 2003, had sensed the danger inherent in the militias. He had ordered the dismantling of all militias in the country and offered them an option of joining the post-war army.
However, caught in the middle of the security and political chaos that followed the invasion of Iraq, Bremer was unable to enforce the order, and today the US is facing an impossible situation.
It was yet another monumental mistake that the US committed in Iraq after the disbanding of the Sunni-dominated Iraqi army. Many former army soldiers are now believed to be actively engaged in the raging insurgency there. They have formed their own area units in order to protect the community from the Shiite militiamen.
Caught in the middle of the confrontation are ordinary Iraqis, both Shiites and Sunnis.
Thousands of families have been displaced from their villages. They had no choice to pack whatever belongings they had and leave their ancestral homes in the face of ultimatums served by local militiamen.
The displacement poses a major humanitarian crisis for the community as well as the government and voluntary relief agencies.
Many of the displaced are now housed in mosques in Baghdad and the capital's outskirts, and they live in a perpetual fear of being targeted for attack despite the sanctity of the mosque they live in.
The US strategists are now pinning hopes that a proposed joint committee made up of top officials from the interior ministry (headed by a Shiite) and the defence ministry (led by a Sunni) could be mandated with reining in the militiamen.
However, it would seem to be a pipedream because there is no compelling reason for anyone to sign on to the proposal.
Simply put, the majority Shiites are basking in their newfound domination of the Iraqi society and they would not be dissuaded by the US military or any other force except their political leadership.
The Sunnis are feeling the heat and they are determined to put up as much resistance as possible against efforts to impose fait accomplis on them. They may or may not accept American assurance of good faith, but they know that they could not expect the US military to protect them from the marauding militiamen.
The American hope of restoring order in Baghdad is pinned on formation of a government after months of political haggling following elections in December. However, there is no guarantee that the new government would be able to create enough confidence among Iraqis in the midst of continued abductions and killings.
Some suggest that a civil war is already under way. Others believe the worse is yet to come, and predict a disintegration of the country. Yet some others are convinced that Iraq could be put back on its feet if the US plays its cards right with its Iraqi and regional allies.
On the ground, however, the US faces the formidable task of removing the militiamen from the scene if it were to hope for pacifying the Sunnis. In the meantime, the country is slipping deeper and deeper into an abyss.
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